


Across a room filled with people less important than you

by my_deer_friend



Series: Pictures of you [2]
Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Established Relationship, Fluff and Angst, Henry Laurens' A+ Parenting, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Lams - Freeform, M/M, References to Depression, Slice of Life, brief sexy-times
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-17
Updated: 2020-06-17
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:22:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24773083
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/my_deer_friend/pseuds/my_deer_friend
Summary: Alex takes a day off. It gets worse before it gets better.---TW for discussions of depression and tiny mention of suicidal ideation.
Relationships: Alexander Hamilton/John Laurens
Series: Pictures of you [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1791655
Comments: 15
Kudos: 99





	Across a room filled with people less important than you

**Author's Note:**

> I have realised that these vignettes segue neatly into a longer story I am writing, so I'm putting them together into a series. Enjoy!

The next morning, Alex is half-way to the door - having crawled out of bed, showered, dressed and downed a scalding coffee - when he remembers that he took the day off. 

Feeling both irritated and embarrassed, he glances through to the bedroom and sees John is still fast asleep. For a moment, he considers slipping out quietly - just for a few hours - to get some things done and check in with his boss about the report he submitted. He lingers in the liminal space of the entrance hall, perfectly balanced between his opposing priorities. 

Then he sighs and turns back into the apartment, drops his satchel and hangs his coat over the back of the couch while he mentally awards himself a medal for making the right choice. He slips back into the bedroom and pulls off his work clothes and dumps them in a pile on the ground. As he climbs back into bed, John turns to face him and gives him a sleepy grin.

“I was wondering how long it would take you to remember.”

“Bastard,” Alex grumbles, but leans in and kisses John’s forehead. He turns around so that his back is against John’s sleep-warm chest and pulls John’s arm over his ribs and to his stomach.

“I would have stopped you if you’d actually reached the door,” John mumbles sleepily, settling against the length of Alex’s body and giving the back of his neck a kiss. A minute later, his breathing slows again and Alex feels the arm across him relax as John falls back into sleep.

This is nice, Alex thinks. 

But he quickly becomes restless. His hair is still damp from the shower and the spot where it lies cold between his face and the pillow starts to annoy him. The coffee in his system is waking him up. And the little restless voice at the back of his mind is making his nerves tingle with the effort it takes to lie still.

When he feels he can no longer bear it, he shifts to get out from under John’s arm, but John makes a disgruntled noise in his sleep and tightens his hold. Considering that John actually works out - not like Alex, whose exercise regime consists of walking to and from the subway or the coffee shop - the grip keeps him firmly in place. 

Alex sighs.

He wishes he was the kind of person who could sleep in on a day off. Wishes desperately there was some way he could decant just enough of the nervous energy in his chest that lying here would be pleasant rather than just frustrating. 

Alex tries to summon back the guilt he felt when he'd been back in Seattle, but it all seems to have dissolved away overnight. He wants to  _ do something _ , and wasting time staring at the bedroom door is not cutting it. Besides, John is fast asleep, so it’s not like they’re actually spending time together.

He tries again, twisting away from John’s arm, and manages to slide out of bed without waking him. For good measure, he grabs the lion plushie and tucks it into the space he just vacated. But, even in sleep, John isn’t fooled. He makes another aggrieved noise and turns onto his other side. Alex feels like he’s been scolded.

Of course, now that he’s up, Alex faces the next dilemma - what to do? His overriding instinct is to flip open his laptop and check his work emails. He suppresses the urge, but a knot of anxiety forms behind his diaphragm. What if his boss has questions about the report? What if there’s a crisis at work? Or worse, what if there’s a crisis and someone else steps in and fixes it, without giving Alex the chance? What if they figure out they can cope a whole day without him?

_ Breathe _ , he admonishes himself.  _ It’s just fucking email _ . The knot doesn’t unravel.

What’s plan B?

Alex wanders into the kitchen to make more coffee while he considers his options. As he waits for the machine to do its magic, he glances around. 

The kitchen is John’s domain. Alex can’t cook for shit and isn’t home often enough to bother to learn. John, on the other hand, took up cooking in the grief-addled time after his mom died as a way to keep her memory alive - and he eventually got quite into it, built up a pantry and store of gadgets and utensils that he keeps neat and ordered according to his own impenetrable system. Alex realises now that he hasn’t actually seen John cook something in weeks. In part, it’s because he just hasn’t been home, the nagging guilty voice reminds him.

And now, Alex starts noticing that the kitchen isn’t in its usual pristine state. Dishes have started to pile up. The recycling bin is so full that there are bottles and boxes stacked up next to it. Various food items have been left out on the counter among empty takeout boxes. Crumbs dust the table.

No doubt this is a symptom of John’s declining mental state, and it’s a frustrating reminder that pops Alex’s bubble of denial.

He decides to deal with both the mess and his conscience in one go, so he finishes his coffee and gets to work. He takes out the recycling first, then he starts packing away all the food and the clean dishes that had been washed and left out in the dish rack, taking his best guess at where things should go based on the spaces in the cabinets - though he does end up shoving a few things in.

Then he sets to the worst part - washing the dishes. Alex  _ hates _ doing it. As the smallest kid in any foster home, he got bullied into it by the other kids who took the easier chores. He has always dreamed of getting a dishwasher, but their kitchen isn’t big enough. When they move somewhere bigger, it’s going to be the first thing he buys. 

But he can’t get around it now, so he sets to scrubbing, grateful for at least the thin protection of rubber kitchen gloves. It takes longer than he expects, and by the time he puts the last pan out to dry he’s desperate for his next coffee. The pot has cooled off, so he pours half a mug, downs it, then refills the mug and heats it up in the microwave.

He takes the coffee back to the lounge. The sofa is covered with John’s detritus - blankets, books, his iPad - so Alex grabs his laptop and sits down on the armchair, tucking his legs up to one side and balancing his computer precariously on his knees. 

Would it really be the end of the world if he just took one proper day off? 

Then again, would it be the end of the world if he just checked his inbox quickly?

He shouldn’t... 

He really shouldn’t. 

But like the world’s dullest addict, he flips the screen open and fires up his Outlook.

A minute in, he regrets his decision to stay home. There’s been a company-wide meeting called this morning to discuss a new case their firm is considering taking on. It’s one of those David and Goliath financial fraud matters - the perfect mix of complex and high-profile and meaningful - and Alex is dying to be assigned to it. He’s already prepped all the arguments for why they should take it on, but now he’s not going to get the chance to deliver them. The restlessness in his chest turns into a real ache. He’s missing something genuinely important. 

Then he hears John stir, and the guilt is back. 

Why is striking this balance so  _ hard _ ?

A minute later, John shuffles into the room and comes to stand behind Alex. John ruffles his hair and kisses the top of his head.

“Morning,” John says.

“Hey.”

“Working.” It’s not a question.

“Um, just a bit. Sorry.”

“‘S fine,” John shrugs. He continues into the bathroom, and when he emerges after a shower he looks much more awake. Alex looks up to admire his still-damp hair tumbling down onto his shoulders. John gives him a wink and goes into the kitchen.

“Oh wow, did you clean up?”

Alex shrugs again, then remembers John can’t see him and calls, “Yup.”

“Thanks. Been meaning to get to it…”

“It’s fine. I live here too.”

John hums something. Alex hears him opening and closing cabinets. “Did you…? Where...?” 

Alex puts his laptop aside and goes to the kitchen. He sees John’s shoulders tense up just a little as he starts unloading and repacking the cabinets. 

John sighs softly. “Alex, you need to put stuff back in the proper places.”

Alex prickles. They’ve had this argument before. “Why? Does it really matter?” 

“It matters,” John says in his I’m-really-trying-to-be-patient voice, “Because otherwise I can’t find the stuff I need.”

“We don’t have  _ that _ many cabinets.”

“Oh? Okay, so where’s my cereal bowl?”

Alex starts yanking doors open himself. He feels a tingle of annoyance when he needs to check three spots before he finds it, which sort-of proves John’s point. He clanks the bowl down onto the counter. “There. Jeez. I was just trying to help.”

John sighs again. “Yeah, I know. Sorry. It’s just, it’s important to me. I’ve told you.”

“Yeah, yeah…” John  _ has _ told him. Alex throws out the old coffee filter and puts a new one in, avoiding John’s eyes.

John sighs for a third time. “It’s your day off. Can you maybe not be so grumpy?”

Alex bites his cheek, wishing he could just hold his tongue but knowing he can’t let John have the last word. “Yeah, telling someone they’re grumpy is a great way to get them to cheer up.”

John huffs but doesn’t reply, just sets about pouring cornflakes and milk into his bowl, then retreats to the lounge. He leaves the cornflakes out on the counter. Alex stares at them. He’s torn between just leaving them there and putting them back.

Then he gets the coffee on and relents a little, putting the cornflakes away and pulling out a second mug for John, adding his preferred measures of milk and sugar. Alex watches the machine slowly complete its task, and by the time it’s done and he’s poured the two mugs, his hackles are lowering again.  _ Peace offering _ , he thinks, following after John.

John has pushed his stuff to one side and is sitting on the far end of the couch from the armchair, one leg tucked under the other knee, shovelling cereal into his mouth. Alex puts John’s mug down next to him on the table and John gives him a smile and a little “thanks” between mouthfuls.

Alex has just pulled his laptop back when John takes a sip and splutters. 

“Did you - uh, sugar?” John asks, making a face.

Alex groans. Nothing is going right this morning. “I put some in-- oh shit, forgot to stir it. Hang on…” He starts to get up.

“No, don’t worry, I’ve got it,” John says at the same time, also standing up.

“Sit down, it’s fine,” Alex says, a little too sharply.

“I’ve  _ got _ it,” John insists.

They’re standing, stuck, impossibly deadlocked.

Alex rubs his eyes, grimacing. “What’s going on with us?” 

John runs his hands through his hair. In a small voice, he says, “I don’t know.”

Alex doesn’t know what else to do, so he steps over to John and wraps his arms tightly around him, pressing his face to his chest. John stands stiffly for a moment, but then Alex feels his arms come up over his shoulders. 

“I’m sorry,” Alex mumbles into the fabric of John’s shirt. “I’m tired and I’m stressed. I’m not angry at you.”

“It’s okay,” John huffs into his hair. “I’m sorry too. Guess we’re both having a hard time right now.”

Alex squeezes tighter, feels a distant prickle in his eyes but pushes it down, breathes deeply, masters himself. When he’s almost certain he’s not going to cry, he pulls back and kisses John’s cheek. 

“I think we both need a break. Wanna go out somewhere? Change of scenery?”

“Um. I thought we would just stay home today. Wasn’t that the plan?”

Alex holds in his sigh, and tries to keep the inflection of annoyance out of his voice. “Just a walk around the block? We can go grab bagels for lunch from the deli. You’ll feel better, I promise.”

John takes just a second too long to respond. “Sure.”

“Finish up here and get ready, I’m just popping in the shower.”

Alex extricates himself and spends a long time under the hot water, trying to scrub away the foggy wisps of pettiness he’s feeling so that he doesn’t ruin the whole day for both of them. He knows he should rise above it, but he’s only human, and he thinks grumpily that John should be making more of an effort too. After all, Alex is the one working a crazy job, doing his best to get ahead, and kinda saving the world one case at a time while John just mopes about at home doing random PR work for NGOs and can’t even cheer up long enough to--

No. Alex cuts off that train of thought. He can’t let himself go there.

Eventually - feeling cleaner, if not mellower - Alex goes to the bedroom and puts on some jeans, a shirt, a sweater and a jacket over that. He pulls out a scarf too. John peeks in, wearing only a cardigan over his clothes. 

“You know it’s like seventy out, right?” he says with a gentle teasing note. 

Alex realises this is a truce. A safe conversation. This he can work with. 

“Yes, exactly,” Alex sniffs. “Freezing.” 

“Come on,” John says and reaches out his hand. Alex takes it gratefully. Seems like John actually is making an effort, so he resolves to do the same. 

They stroll down the street hand in hand, Alex grateful for John’s warmth beside him. It’s a crisp fall day, but the sun is out and the street is bustling. 

“You know, this is kinda nice,” Alex offers. “Just walking. Not having somewhere to be.”

John smiles and squeezes his hand. “You don’t have to say that.”

“No, really,” Alex doubles down, slipping his arm out of John’s hand and around his waist. “I mean, I wouldn’t want to do it every day, but maybe I should a bit more often.”

John hums. After a moment, he adds, “I envy you, you know that?”

Alex laughs.

“I do.”

He turns to look at John and studies his expression. John looks uneasy, as though he’s had to build up the courage to say this. “Really? What for?” Alex asks, a bit more gently.

“It’s just- you have so much  _ purpose _ . You’ve found your thing in life. You get up every morning and you have something that matters to throw yourself into.” John’s jaw tightens against the welling up of some unidentified emotion. “I wish I had that.”

Alex tries to choose his words carefully but he doesn’t really know what he’s supposed to say to that. “But you do have that too, don’t you? You’ve got your NGO work, which is super important, and--” he falters, scrambles frantically, “--and your cooking - you love that - and, well, hanging out with our friends and… and you’re really into that TV show, what’s it called again--”

“Well, fuck. You’re proving my point.”

Alex smacks himself internally. “Look. Shitty examples. But I mean, there are tons of people out there who care about you.”

“I know. That’s not what I’m saying.” 

“Don’t you like your job?”

“I do,” John says, sounding frustrated. “It’s interesting, and it’s useful. But it’s not, like, my dream. I’m not  _ passionate _ about it the way you are with your stuff. I don’t still want to be doing this when I’m fifty. Or, hell, forty.”

Alex draws himself closer to John’s side, partly to comfort him but also to hide his face. He’s no good at this stuff. “You’re smart and kind and there’s tons of stuff you’re great at. Maybe you just need to keep looking. You’ll find something eventually.”

John sighs. “Yeah. I know. That’s what you’re supposed to do - just keep trying.” He’s quiet for a moment. “It’s just that, every time my birthday comes around, it feels like another year of my life has gone to waste. I worry that I won’t find the right thing in time.”

And this - this resignation, this hopeless note - is something Alex  _ really _ can’t handle. He is no stranger to anxiety and post-traumatic stress, but all of his issues make sense given the circumstances he grew up in. But the fact that John gets sad  _ just because _ bewilders and frightens him.

Alex had once been invited to tag along to one of John’s therapy sessions (and, of course, he’d bristled at having to take an extended lunch break because he had  _ stuff to do _ ). He’d sat in the chair next to John, fiddling with his jacket cuff and feeling out of place, and had mostly tuned out until the therapist said  _ something-something-suicidal-ideation _ . Alex had turned in shock to look at John - but John was talking evenly, comfortably, like this wasn’t news to him. The rush in Alex’s ears had drowned out all the words. 

His heart had still been racing when they left the practice. 

He’d stared at his screen at work until it was time to go home, unable to assemble a single coherent thought.

The next day, he’d snuck home over lunch, knowing John would be out, and had rifled through their apartment to look for things that John might use to hurt himself with. The futility of the task had quickly become apparent. Alex remembers sitting on the bathroom floor, staring at all the pills and chemicals in the cabinet under the sink, having something like a panic attack.

It had taken him four days to build up the courage to ask John about it. John had just smiled ruefully and said, “No, silly, it doesn’t really mean I want to kill myself. It’s more like… I guess… wanting to not-exist? Sometimes? But that’s why I go to therapy.” John had preempted his next questions too. “And no, it's not your fault, and no, there's nothing you can do about it.”

He pulls himself back into the present, heart hammering, trying to pick up the thread. “You will find something. I know you will. I believe in you, Jack. Also, don’t measure yourself by my standard,” he adds, trying to inject some humour. “We all know I’m extra.”

And indeed, Alex sometimes wonders if there is something actually wrong with  _ him _ , because even his most successful friends aren’t driven in the way he is. Then again, none of them have that perfect cocktail of ambition and nerve and skill mixed with the terror that comes from having once been poor. He doesn’t think that John ever really understood that about him, considering how well off his family is. John has never been one unplanned expense away from homelessness. He doesn’t get that a paycheck and a bit of savings in the bank isn’t enough of a net; that, no matter how much money he makes, it will take Alex a lifetime to stitch a safety blanket that feels big and strong enough. 

“If only you could share some of your energy with me,” John says, a hint of a smile in his voice again.

“God, I wish. Let me tell you, it’s no picnic going a hundred miles an hour all the time. I read a study that said work stress generates the same adrenaline as being chased by bears.  _ Bears _ , Jack, plural. I mean, that doesn’t sound healthy, right? So I guess the grass isn’t greener this side, it’s just-- different grass.”

“Heh.”

They’ve reached the deli at this point, and John pops in to pick up a few things while Alex basks in a sunbeam. When John re-emerges, Alex immediately grabs his hand again, feeling that he needs the solid, grounding presence.

“I know we said we’re only coming here, but it’s such a nice day - don’t you want to grab a coffee and go sit in the park?”

This time John smiles more readily. “Sure.”

They grab some takeaway coffees and amble over to the park - more of a green patch between the buildings, partly devoted to a children’s play area. Since it’s the middle of the workday, it’s mostly empty, so they pick a bench that’s in the sun so that Alex can stay warm.

“Okay,” Alex starts. “Thought experiment. Imagine you could live your life over, make new choices knowing everything that you do now. What would you do differently?”

John thinks for a moment. “I don’t know. All the choices led to us being right here, right now, so I don’t think I’d want to risk changing anything.”

Alex rolls his eyes. “Don’t be a sap. Come on.”

“Why? What would you be instead?”

“Pilot,” Alex says immediately. “But not like a glorified-bus-driver, minimum-wage airline pilot. A test pilot.”

John bursts out laughing. “What the hell? Why?”

“Why not? It’s exciting, it’s exclusive, the government tells you all sorts of classified stuff. I bet the medical coverage is premium. Besides, it’s kind of a mandatory step on the way to being an astronaut.”

“Oh? And, what, earth suddenly isn’t enough for you?”

“There aren’t a lot of firsts left in the world, John, for those of us who want to get into the history books. Law is a total dead-end in that regard. But I could still be the first Scottish-Carribean-American astronaut to, I dunno, colonise Mars.”

“You’re not Scottish. And Carribean isn’t a country.”

“I am too Scottish. My surname is Hamilton, for god’s sake. There are whole towns named after me in Scotland.” Alex narrows his eyes. “Oh and nice try, Laurens, but I see you trying to change the topic. Come, now - your ideas can’t be nearly as dumb as mine.”

John throws his head back and sighs. “I really don’t know.”

“John,” he wheedles, “It’s just a game. Imagine there are no constraints, no time or money issues, no  _ Henry… _ ”

This must be the magic word, because John’s face takes a complicated route through a sequence of emotions before landing on what looks like thoughtfulness. He’s quiet for a long time, just staring into the middle distance.

“John?” Alex prompts.

“You know, it’s funny,” John says. “If I think back now, as a kid I had all these dreams about what I wanted to be. Firefighter, doctor, biologist, vet - and I’m sure astronaut was in there too. My mom indulged all of it, but once she was gone it was like childhood was over and all the dreams that were part of it just… went away. For Henry, it was all about making the sensible choices, and that meant his eldest son following in his footsteps. After all, he’d spent his life building all this influence and momentum and he wanted to pass it on. His legacy. And the crazy thing is, some of my best memories after mom died are actually with him - because for the first time I got to feel like he was really taking me under his wing.” 

John sighs, but when he continues he doesn’t sound bitter. 

“I guess that without her, he didn’t have anything other than his work, since he’d never invested the time in building real relationships with the rest of his family. So I became the substitute. God, it made me feel so special. He’d take me along to meet people, to see how politics is done. He even let me pick the campaigns I wanted to get involved in, since even then he knew our views were not the same. I guess he figured once I grew up a bit, I’d come around to his perspective. He didn’t say anything when I got involved in pro-immigration and queer rights stuff - in fact, he really helped me learn the ropes of negotiating, bargaining, when to put pressure on and when to give in, how to sacrifice symbolic victories for substantive ones. I mean, I’ll never be a diplomat,” and they share a wry smile at John’s naturally blunt manner, “But ironically it was Henry who taught me how to stand up for the things I believe in.”

Alex has so many questions about this slice of John’s life that he rarely hears about - the part after his mom died but before they met that exists as kind of a black hole in his otherwise-intimate knowledge of John - but he swallows them down. It feels more important to let John get to where he’s going.

John frowns. “Henry is such a big presence. I mean, you’ve met him, you know - he commands any room he walks into. For a while I got absorbed into that, lured in by the sudden access to this whole other private side of him. By the time I was picking out colleges, it wasn’t even a question that I was going to do pol-sci. And I had this silly idea that I could go away, study a bit, then come back home and use Henry’s name and influence to do some good. Bring some social justice to the south. Then I came up here and met this really cute guy with a loud mouth who was taking all the same classes...” John smiles at the memory but doesn’t turn his head. The smile melts away almost as soon as it appears. “Well, then, we both know what happened after that.”

Oh, Alex knows. John came out to his father soon after they got together and, as a result, Henry basically cut him off overnight. They didn’t speak at all for two years. And although they had reconciled since then, it was clearly too late to salvage any of the plans that they had made together. Alex doesn’t think that he will ever be able to forgive Henry for some of the things he called John - toxic, filthy, shameful, cowardly - but for John’s sake, he does his best to keep his plentiful opinions on the topic to himself. 

Even now, Alex sits still and quiet, trying not to break the spell.

“I don’t know - I guess this is a long way of saying that I haven’t had my own dream about what to do with myself for so long that I’ve forgotten how. First I was trying to make Henry happy, then I was trying to piss him off as much as possible. I’ve never actually considered what I would want without him in the picture.”

_ Fuck him _ , Alex wants to scream, and tightens his hand around his own thigh.  _ You don’t need him; you have me _ . 

But now that he examines it, perhaps the contrast between him and Henry is less stark and flattering than Alex wishes it was. Distant, self-absorbed, choosing work over family, out of tune with this gentle and vulnerable side of John… Alex swallows down a sudden rush of bile.

He does  _ not _ want to follow this train of thought. Not now, and not ever. 

Luckily, it seems that John is lost enough in his thoughts that he doesn’t pick up on the horrified look that crosses Alex’s face. Alex wipes it away quickly and schools his voice around the tightness in his jaw. 

“So? Any ideas coming to you?” he asks in an encouraging tone.

John huffs. “I’ll let you know. It’s… a lot.”

“Wanna head home?”

“Yeah.”

Back at the apartment, Alex’s laptop glares at him judgmentally, so he packs it away and instead surrenders to spending the rest of the day on the couch. 

John lays out a feast of their favourite deli snacks on the coffee table. They bundle under a mountain of blankets and spend the afternoon snacking and watching awful early-2000s sitcoms that haven’t aged well. Mostly, they ad-lib through the tasteless sexist and homophobic jokes, and Alex is reminded just how funny and ruthless John can be. 

He keeps catching himself looking across at John instead of at the TV. Marvelling at just how radiant he is when all facades are stripped away - this secret, private, unselfconscious person that pretty much only Alex has ever been allowed to see.

John catches him looking.

“What?”

Alex smiles a goofy grin. “God, I just love you so much,” he says.

John rolls his eyes, but he flushes and smiles too. “C’mere.” He opens his arms and Alex crawls across and settles against his chest. Hums contentedly.

A while later, Alex feels John’s fingers snaking under his sweater and, oh yes, he can get behind this change of plans.

They tease each other slowly - a hand on a thigh, a graze of lips on the side of a jaw, all subtle and deniable - until the swelling tide of arousal turns against them both and Alex pounces. But even then, they take their time, lazily uncovering hot patches of skin, swallowing moans into long kisses, drawing each other tight as bowstrings. And after Alex finally makes John come hot and pulsing down his throat, groaning and crying above him, they collapse into a sated heap and almost instantly fall asleep.

Alex wakes up to warmth and quiet and a hand gently stroking his hair. He turns to look up and sees that John is watching him thoughtfully. 

“Hello, sunshine,” John teases as Alex wipes the sleep from his eyes.

“Did we sleep long?”

“You did. Looked like you needed it.”

Like frustrating clockwork, he feels that twinge of guilt at the wasted time - but this one is a bit easier to quash. He yawns instead and snuggles in closer.

“I’ve thought about it,” John says suddenly. 

“Oh, and?”

John just sighs in response.

“Come on, Jack, the suspense is killing me.”

“I’d be an artist.”

Alex makes a surprised sound. 

“I mean, it’s not like it’s actually a feasible option. It’s basically impossible to make money and it’s mostly thankless and difficult and lonely work. But, I remember how absorbed I was as a kid when we had art classes, how I’d spend my whole summer drawing things out of books or making sketches of things we saw on holiday. After mom was gone, we did these art classes at school and that really helped make sense of all the - stuff.” He gestures vaguely at his head. “Art’s a powerful way to send a message. An easier way to express things when words fail. So yeah, if I could do things over again, I’d have gone to art school and become a starving artist.”

Alex chews this over. It tallies with John’s love of visiting galleries and the occasional bouts when he feels creative and ends up buying all sorts of supplies and then painting for weeks. But he hasn’t done that in years.

“I’m never going to go to space, but your one isn’t completely impossible,” Alex muses.

John snorts. “No, it’s silly.”

“I don’t know the first thing about art, but why don’t you start small? Pick up your painting again.”

“Maybe,” John says noncommittally. 

“Got nothing to lose,” Alex reasons.

“Yeah.” After a moment of quiet, he continues, almost as though he’s trying to talk himself out of it. “I mean, I wouldn’t even know where to start. If I really wanted to do it seriously, I’d have to go to art school, which is crazy expensive, so I wouldn’t be able to work. And after that, I mean, it’s notoriously hard to even make a name for yourself, never mind selling anything or making any real money. It’s a pipe dream.”

Alex shrugs. “Crazier things have happened. To you, even.”

“Hmm. Anyway, there’s your answer. Happy?”

“Ecstatic,” Alex says, stretching out languidly. “What time is it?”

“Almost seven.”

“Mmm. Should we order in? Watch a movie?”

“Sounds good.”

They order Vietnamese and argue about which movie to watch until the food arrives, the new containers adding to the existing clutter on the table. John eventually talks him into a slow slice-of-life film with a heavy side of romance (a far cry from the political thriller that was Alex’s contender), and Alex has to fight to pay attention to the movie. He itches to grab his phone and do something more productive, but he refuses to give in now at the final hurdle. Pure stubbornness keeps his eyes glued to the screen until he eventually gets drawn into the narrative, when the twist midway reveals the protagonist is actually in love with her best female friend rather than the token popular boy.

When the movie finishes, they tidy up and get ready for bed together. Alex is usually up much later that John, but his nap has paradoxically made him feel more tired, and it  _ is _ his day off, after all. They crawl under the sheets together, eager for more contact even though they’ve spent most of the day touching. This time it’s Alex who pulls John to him, feeling his breath alternating hot and cold across his collarbone.

“So, did you have a good day?” John asks sleepily.

“Me? Yeah. It was pretty great. Nice to hang out with the sexiest Laurens sibling.” John snorts. “What about you?”

“Best birthday present ever,” he says.

“You’re a cheap date,” Alex teases.

“Considering I paid for all the food, yes.” He pokes Alex in the ribs. “But yes, today was good.”

“Gonna think about the art thing some more?”

John shrugs. “Maybe.” But this ‘maybe’ is a bit more thoughtful and considered than the dismissive one on the couch earlier. Alex presses a kiss to John’s curls.

“Whatever it takes to make you happy.”

“ _ Us _ . We’re a package deal.”

“Well, I’m happy when you’re happy, so that’s an easy one.”

“Would you still love me if I’m poor?”

“I would love you double. You’d need it. Hard to keep warm without someone paying the heating bills.”

“Good.”

“You going to sleep now?”

“Mmm.”

“Night night.”

“Sleep tight.”

And Alex thinks that tonight, he will.

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from Love Love Love by Of Monsters And Men.
> 
> Would love to hear what you thought of this!


End file.
